Zack

by Mons Kallentoft

  The color printout emerges. Zack picks it up and examines it carefully.

  “You’re right,” he says, giving the map to Deniz. “I just need to check that I’ve got enough extra clips.”

  He feels the leather pockets on his holster.

  “Fuck!”

  “What?”

  “My Sig Sauer. I left it at the hospital.”

  “You’re kidding? Why did you put it down there?”

  “The magazine’s been sticking for the past couple of days, and I was sitting there trying to clean it while I waited for Sukayana to wake up. Then her doctor came in, so I hid it quickly under the cushion of the chair. I didn’t want him to see me sitting in Intensive Care with a pistol. Later I just picked up my jacket and left, without even looking at the chair. I was badly shaken up by Sukayana’s death.”

  Deniz shakes her head and looks at him with concern.

  “You’ve really got to get your act together.”

  “I’ll go back to the hospital and get it. Can you sort out the operation in the meantime? I’ll be back within half an hour.”

  “Come down to the garage when you get back. We should be ready to set off by then.”

  Zack closes the door of the Special Crimes Unit behind him and heads toward the elevators. He looks back to make sure no one’s watching, then stands on tiptoe and carefully pushes up one of the ceiling panels. He sticks one hand into the gap, grabs his pistol, and tucks it inside his jeans. He pulls his T-shirt down over it, and presses the elevator button.

  59

  TWO MEN leave the house, following a well-worn path into the pine forest.

  One is wearing a black T-shirt and has an Uzi slung over his shoulder. A livid red scar runs down one cheek to his neck.

  “Did you bring the ropes, Hakan?” he says to the other man, with cropped hair in camouflage clothing.

  “Yes, I’ve got them here,” Hakan says, holding up the coils in his hand.

  The air is buzzing with midges.

  “Fucking hell,” the man with the scar says, scraping the remains of a bloody midge from the back of his neck. “They’re almost worse than back home. I lay awake half the night scratching.”

  “You’ve turned into a real wimp, Tuncay, an urban sissy,” Hakan says. “I’ll have to ask Thrakya to put you to work up the mountains, to make a man of you again.”

  “Like hell you will.”

  Hakan holds out a pack of Maltepe. “Here, have a cigarette. The smoke keeps them away.”

  As they approach the dug-out cellar Tuncay pulls off his Uzi and aims it at the door. Hakan takes a jangling set of keys from his jeans pocket and looks through them to find the right one.

  Then he pulls a pistol from the waistband of his trousers, a silver Zigana M16, and holds it in his hand as he undoes the padlock.

  Inside the dark cellar the girls huddle together as they hear the men’s voices, then the sound of the padlock being removed and the bolt slid back.

  A newborn baby is lying in the arms of one of the girls, Than Than Oo. A little boy with black hair, curly from the damp air of the cellar.

  He’s lying in his mother’s arms, sleeping soundly. Than Than Oo holds him tightly to her chest and whispers that everything is going to be all right.

  60

  ZACK PULLS on his helmet and turns the ignition of the Hayabusa, and it roars into life.

  Deniz is going to kill me, he thinks. But time’s running out. If he waits until the operational team is assembled, it could be too late.

  The Turks are shutting down.

  And they’re unlikely to go to the effort of taking the girls out of the country.

  Alone against five, ten, maybe twenty armed members of the Turkish mafia. What a great idea. How exactly were you thinking of sorting this out on you own?

  He knows it’s crazy, but he has to make sure that real justice is achieved.

  There are young girls out there.

  Children, like Ester.

  He has to do it, for her sake.

  For Sukayana’s.

  And for the murdered women. The ones who were forced to come here and were treated like meat by men like Sten Westberg.

  And for Mom’s.

  The clock on the instrument panel says 5:36. He should be able to get there before half past six if he tries.

  He flies along the E18 at ninety miles an hour, and is fifteen miles from Enköping when he hears the police siren behind him.

  Not now.

  He checks the rearview mirror. A patrol car. Probably a traffic unit from Enköping or Uppsala.

  There’s no way he’s thinking of stopping.

  The wind tears at his jeans and thin leather jacket as he accelerates to 120 miles an hour, and watches the patrol disappear from view behind him.

  A few minutes later he reaches Enköping, slows down sharply, and leaves the freeway without encountering another patrol. He carries on heading north on minor roads, passing villages with names like Äs, Brunnsta, and Larsbo, houses with traditional rust-red façades and white paintwork, until he eventually reaches Highway 72, where he turns left toward Vittinge. When he reaches the village he turns off again, following a winding road lined with dense forest, before taking another left turn and heading due north along a poorly maintained gravel track, surrounded by even thicker forest.

  Clouds of insects hit the visor of his helmet, and the trees are the height of three-story buildings. He imagines he can see wolves in the darkness between the trees, and wonders if he’s getting as crazy as the people he’s hunting.

  Then the landscape opens out. Large yellow fields spread out, and off to the left he sees what he’s been looking for: the water pump.

  It stands on the boundary between field and forest, and Zack can’t help feeling that he’s been transported back a hundred years in time.

  He slows down to take a better look. It’s nowhere near as tall as he was expecting. Perhaps fifty feet at most. At the base of the wooden tower is a small round pond, but Zack can’t see if there’s any water in it.

  The treetops are swaying gently in the light breeze, but the rotor of the wind pump isn’t moving. Zack wonders why anyone would choose to build it there, of all places, in a field surrounded by tall forest. The island of Öland or the southern province of Skåne feel like they would have been more suitable locations.

  Perhaps someone thought it was attractive, or just wanted to have a unique landmark. They certainly achieved that.

  Zack checks the GPS on his cell. About two miles to go. He rides a bit farther along the gravel road, keeping an eye out for the even smaller track that ought to lead off to the left anytime now.

  It appears immediately after a sharp bend, and even though Zack is driving slowly he only sees it at the last moment. The opening is almost covered by leafy branches.

  The track is more of a wide path than a road. It’s made of compacted soil and roots, and so narrow that the branches must scratch the paint of any vehicle that tries to drive down it. Zack can barely manage twelve miles an hour, and has to weave constantly between the biggest roots and rocks to avoid damaging the Hayabusa.

  After half a mile he stops and checks the GPS again. He’s about half a mile from the house now, and he doesn’t want the Turks to hear the sound of the motorcycle and get suspicious.

  He looks for a suitable place to hide the bike, and discovers two rough tire tracks made by a heavy-duty piece of forestry machinery leading off into the pine trees to his right.

  He follows one of the tire tracks until he’s out of sight from the main path. He leaves the bike there leaning against a tree. He’s shivering after the cold ride, and the midges start to attack him at once. He swats them away, jogs back to the track, and runs the last stretch toward the house. Every sense is alert, he slows down at the slightest sound, ready to throw himself into the forest at any moment.

  A ramshackle little cottage with large holes in its roof appears on his left. Zack can’t recall having seen it on the
satellite picture of the area. Huge pine trees reach up into the sky on either side of the shack, and Zack guesses that their branches hide the roof from above.

  A hundred yards farther on, Zack can just make out a large barn through the trees, and he darts quickly into the forest. The ground is covered with soft moss, and he moves silently and carefully.

  Soon he can see the whole of the faded red side of the barn. He crouches down behind a large, moss-covered rock, looking for any sign of movement. There’s no one in sight.

  The silence is broken by the sound of an old door opening. Then he hears the screaming of frightened girls.

  And barking and growling.

  Fuck. What’s going on? Are they throwing more people to the wolves?

  He pulls out his Sig Sauer and runs toward the barn.

  * * *

  DOUGLAS COMES rushing out of his office.

  “Where’s Zack?”

  “On his way here, I hope,” Deniz says.

  She’s just put on her thin white summer jacket, and is on her way down to the garage for a last run-through with the rapid response unit.

  “So why have I just been told that he was seen a short while away racing away from a patrol car on the E18 outside Enköping?”

  Deniz freezes midstride.

  “Zack, you bastard,” she mutters to herself.

  He tricked her. He tricked them all. He didn’t go to Södermalm Hospital to pick up his pistol. He headed straight off to Vittinge.

  He’s thinking of tackling the mafia guys on his own.

  She looks at Douglas and can see in his eyes that he too has worked out what’s going on.

  He grabs his jacket so roughly that the hanger falls to the floor, and says as they’re hurrying for the door:

  “Now it really is urgent.”

  Deniz follows him out.

  Why, Zack? What are you trying to prove? she thinks. Do you think you can save your mother by rescuing those women in the forest?

  In that case you’re more damaged than I realized.

  But also braver.

  Braver than anyone should be.

  * * *

  HIS SIG Sauer feels cold in his hand as Zack creeps along the back of the barn.

  Crooked planks, red paint peeling off.

  He’s trying to find a door, but can’t see one, and follows the wall until he reaches the corner. He crouches down.

  Dare I look around the corner?

  Is someone standing there with a pistol, ready to shoot me?

  Sweat on his forehead.

  Racing heartbeat.

  More screaming from inside the barn.

  He hasn’t got a choice. He peers cautiously around the corner.

  Thirty yards away is a small red farmhouse, tucked next to the edge of the forest. A black Toyota van is parked on the grass beside it. An out-of-place warm glow is coming from the kitchen window, but he can’t see any movement.

  Tall, wide doors in the middle of the barn wall.

  Closed. He can’t go in that way, or he’ll run straight into Yildizyeli.

  But beyond the doors is a sturdy flight of wooden steps that must lead up to a hayloft.

  The shutters of the loft are wide open, and that’s where the screaming is coming from.

  And the growling.

  Zack looks out at the idyllic scenery. The greenery, the wind rustling the trees. Then comes another scream, and he thinks of what Nang Mon said in the police car out in Skärholmen.

  They pushed her over the edge.

  The wolves tore her to pieces.

  In here is where it happens.

  Then there’s a gruff male voice, a baby starts crying, followed by a woman’s voice:

  “No, no. Please, no!”

  Zack can hear the terror in her voice. Clutching his Sig Sauer, he runs for the flight of steps.

  He’s expecting to be shot at any moment, by someone in the house or hidden among the trees.

  But he doesn’t hesitate, as if bullets can’t hurt him now. As if he has some sort of invisible protection that other people lack.

  He practically flies up the steps with his pistol raised in front of him.

  The screams.

  Forcing their way into him for good. Pitch-black screams, as if from a world bereft of light.

  Zack doesn’t hesitate.

  He rushes out into the loft.

  Piles of old hay to his left. A pitchfork and a rusty shovel leaning against a wooden crate.

  Farther in, a muscular man with an Uzi in his hands, and an ugly scar covering half his face.

  Tuncay.

  Next to Tuncay, three girls, skinny and dirty. One of them has a naked baby in her arms.

  In the gloom he sees what he came to put a stop to.

  Another girl, far too close to the edge of the loft. A pumped-up man with cropped hair and wearing a camouflage jacket is holding her tightly in his thick arms.

  The girl’s hands have been tied behind her back, and she falls silent when she sees Zack, staring at him in surprise, and the look in her eyes pleads: Save me!

  Keep me in this world.

  When the man catches sight of Zack he picks her up and swings her over the edge.

  Let’s go.

  The girl screams again as she falls. A scream beyond the bounds of humanity.

  A different sort of scream from the mouth of the baby.

  The girls are looking at Zack.

  Tuncay. The other man.

  Everyone is looking at him.

  There are wolves growling below the loft, and then that scream which can’t be human but is.

  Tuncay raises the Uzi and aims it at Zack, who throws himself to one side as he fires off three shots in quick succession.

  Bullets spray out of the Uzi. Hit the space where Zack was standing, and as he tumbles onto the rough wooden floor of the loft he sees blood seep through Tuncay’s shirt. He drops the Uzi and falls heavily.

  Zack hears jaws closing on flesh, a throat crushed by a carnivore’s teeth, and then the baby is screaming alone.

  The man in the camouflage jacket has pulled out a pistol.

  From his position on the floor Zack fires his Sig Sauer again. He misses, but the man’s fear of being hit makes him take a step in the wrong direction.

  He stumbles over the edge of the loft.

  Flails with his arms.

  Grabs one of the three remaining girls by the arm and pulls her down with him.

  Zack throws himself forward.

  Grabs her other arm by the wrist and braces one shoe against a protruding piece of wood. He stops her falling, but the man hanging from her other arm is pulling her down.

  She screams. Out of fear, pain.

  Zack is close to the edge now, looks down, and sees a creature with a gray-white pelt tearing lumps of flesh from the body of the girl who fell.

  The straw is turning red.

  So much blood.

  The girl’s arm slides through his grasp. He struggles to get a better grip and she looks up, begging with her eyes.

  A snarling wolf jumps up and sinks its teeth into the calf of the man in the camouflage jacket.

  He roars with pain.

  Kicks at the air, and Zack can no longer hold on with just one hand. He lets go of the pistol and takes hold of the girl’s wrist with both hands, and tries to find somewhere firm to brace his other foot, and then the wolf lets go of the man’s leg and Zack finally manages to get a better foothold.

  He pulls.

  Then the wolf takes another leap and bites the man in the crotch.

  And clings on.

  The look in the man’s eyes changes, becomes nothing but pain, and his hand finally lets go of the girl’s arm.

  Zack pulls her up as he sees the wolves descend upon their new prey.

  She curls up silently on the floor of the loft.

  Zack gets to his knees and tries to find his pistol.

  There.

  It’s balanced on the edge of the loft, it
s barrel sticking out, and he’s about to reach for it when he looks up and sees a skinny man in a black suit holding Tuncay’s Uzi in his hands.

  The narrow face.

  The dimple in his chin.

  The dead look in his eyes.

  Ösgür Thrakya.

  The shadow.

  He smiles, and his greenish-yellow eyes flash like a wolf’s.

  Zack looks into the barrel of the Uzi pointing at him and is filled with shame.

  You let them down.

  He looks at the girl who’s still lying beside him, not daring to move. The young mother has taken a few steps forward and is halfheartedly trying to soothe her child. The slightly older girl standing beside her in a torn red undershirt is shaking.

  The mother stares at him, a pleading look in her eyes.

  Ösgür Thrakya smiles and shakes his head slightly.

  Go on then, do it.

  You’re enjoying this, aren’t you? Looking at me before you kill me.

  “You’re going to die now,” he says in heavily accented English.

  “Go to hell.”

  “So much effort for a few whores.”

  Ösgür Thrakya’s voice is thin but full of poison.

  “Kill me, then. But why do you have to kill the girls and the baby?”

  Ösgür Thrakya smiles again.

  “They’re no use to us anymore. You know how it is, stock that isn’t being used is just a waste of money.”

  “And the baby?”

  “The wolves will probably have room for that too.”

  Tuncay is writhing in agony next to Ösgür Thrakya. He looks up at his boss and says something, and Ösgür Thrakya nods and turns back toward Zack.

  “I was thinking of letting the wolves have you, but Tuncay says he wants to shoot you.”

  Tuncay manages to sit up. Without moving the Uzi away from Zack, Ösgür Thrakya reaches out a hand to help him up.

  Then it happens.

  The girl in the red undershirt makes her move.

  Every muscle in her body tenses, and she throws herself at Ösgür Thrakya with a howl. She grabs his narrow waist in an attempt to knock him off balance and bring him to the floor.

  For a moment, no more than two seconds, the barrel of the Uzi is pointing up in the air.